Creeping Cold
by Sednareinedeseaux
Summary: When Xanxus picked the kid up one night as one would a flower, he didn't exactly know there were some poisonous plants you should just leave to their death. X27 AU with Tsuna as a member of the Varia.


Disclaimer: All the characters belong to Akira Amano. I own nothing.

Warnings: Not a nice story. Violence and obsession and blood and non-graphic gay sex. It's also an AU in which Craddle never happened, the Ninth's sons are alive and Tsuna was abandoned by a psychotic Nana. Some serious OOC. Be warned.

Note: Okay, so that wasn't cool, plot bunnies. I was trying to write something serious and plotty and you just had to make me spit PWP. Not fair. I'll have my revenge. This is Xanxus/Tsuna because they're love, with a bit of Xanxus/Squalo because Squ-chan wouldn't shut up. I hope you enjoy!

* * *

**Creeping Cold**

Tsuna could tell even before Xanxus became aware of it. _It_. The affection that lay silent between them, that had lain there for years and chosen to hide its head under a thick blanket of half-smiles and not-nearly-painful-enough punches. It had grown into some warm creature that had nestled in a corner of his chest and now refused to go. It purred and roared and hissed in time with his own feelings. It rose and shook each time he and Xanxus crossed eyes and mewled in delight at every touch—blows and brushes alike. It dreamt of warm hands petting it softly. It dreamt of hard grips in its fur and sharp, hot pleasure coursing through its veins. It yearned for love and the things that came with it.

Tsuna silenced it and underwent its wrath quietly, waiting for the moment when Xanxus would recognise its existence.

xxx

"It's a shitty life we're living," he said only once. He never said it again because Xanxus began to laugh insanely and nearly drowned himself in his drink and Squalo shot him and dark glance and Lussuria watched him with what looked like pity. He didn't need pity. Pity couldn't wash the blood off his knuckles.

"Took you long enough to get it," Xanxus said and punched him in the shoulder, hard enough that Tsuna knew he was going to have to bear with an angry bruise for the next few days. He didn't say anything. He never said much anyway.

"Whatever," Squalo growled behind him. He knew Xanxus couldn't hear him and he knew Tsuna knew it. "You could still quit and die. Wouldn't be much of a loss."

"Do you want me to shoot you?"

"You can try, runt. My blade's getting restless. I'd like to slice you up a bit."

"Are you talking about your sword," Tsuna said slowly, "or about your dick?"

Xanxus roared again. A brief smile curled Tsuna's lips.

xxx

He was found by Xanxus when he was something like seven years old. Maybe. He couldn't remember the year, much less the date of his birth. It was somewhere in the darkest streets of Namimori. The kind of place where people never went except for a quickie with a whore or to buy some weed away from watchful eyes. Tsuna had lived there for as long as he could remember, sometimes alone and sometimes with other kids like him. Little lost things that they were. Friendless and abandoned. He never minded much; loneliness felt like kin.

He witnessed his first murder that day. It was a quick affair, messy and noisy but finished as soon as it began—just one loud crack in the air and the man fell down and wept tears of blood from places that shouldn't weep. The other man, the one holding the gun, put it back in its holster and looked around carelessly. Their eyes met and held each other's gaze.

"Who are you, then?" the man asked, and took a step forward.

Tsuna did not step back.

"Why'd you kill him?" he said instead, and watched in vague interest as blood ran on the ground all the way to his battered shoes, staining them an angry red.

"Because he was fucking annoying, that's why. Now do you want me to kill you too? Run back to mummy."

"I don't have no mum to run to," Tsuna replied.

The man watched him. Tsuna watched back.

"No?"

"No."

"No mum? Or even dad?"

"No. I don't know. I don't care." He didn't know why he was even talking to this stranger. This scary man with his heavy accent and guns hanging from his belt. He just knew that somehow that man felt like kin, too.

xxx

"So, why the kid?" the one named Squalo asked when he saw him for the first time. "You gonna sell him somewhere or something?"

"Just felt like bringing a pet home," Xanxus answered.

Tsuna didn't bat an eyelash at being called a pet. Instead he looked through the car's windows—he'd never travelled by car before—as the city's lights flashed past him and left bright lines to fade in his eyes.

"Oi. We don't have time for this shit, boss. You already offed Samuele and the Ninth won't like that-"

"The Ninth can kiss my ass for all I care. I shot Samuele because he was being a fucking hindrance, what with eyeing all the whores that walked by and not paying attention to his surroundings. He should have known better than to be a womanising moron when he entered the Varia. We don't need airheads."

"Still doesn't explain why you took the kid," Squalo muttered resentfully.

Tsuna felt Xanxus's gaze in his neck. He didn't turn around to catch it.

"He was interesting. And he saw me anyway. I'm going to observe him some more, see if he can be useful, and I'll kill him if he's not."

This time, Tsuna did turn his head to look uneasily at Xanxus. The man only grinned, and Squalo lost all interest in him, obviously satisfied by this answer.

xxx

Italy was a strange country. Tuscany an even stranger place. The weather changed back and forth from achingly cold to unbearably hot, and Tsuna fell ill many times that first year. This annoyed Squalo greatly and he was often heard through the Varia manor, complaining to any that would listen about the 'fucking runt and his fucking runny nose, always walking uselessly around and putting his fucking bacterias everywhere'. He only stopped when Belphegor got tired and asked him when he became such a pussy.

Lussuria fussed over Tsuna like a mother hen. Tsuna took this overload of affection in stride, not knowing if he should thank or punch him. He felt awkward around so many people, even if thankfully many of them never even glanced in his direction.

He could rarely see Xanxus. When he did, it was when the man ran home reeking of alcohol and in the company of some girl he had met in town. He drank, fucked, slept and left for another hit. Again and again and again and again. Once Tsuna saw him shagging Squalo in a corridor near his room, and he watched silently as they moved against the wall, still fully clothed—except for Squalo's pants which lay rumpled on the carpet—, until finally Squalo let out a strange cry and fell down bonelessly.

Squalo seemed in a much brighter mood after this event, even calling Tsuna 'kid' instead of 'runt' a few times. Tsuna never let him see the knowing smile he felt burning his lips.

xxx

It changed when he first met Sawada Iemitsu, at age twelve.

A delegation from the Ninth was due to arrive that day, and Tsuna was waiting for it in the hallway, not particularly interested in watching a get-together of old mafiosi but bored enough to seek any distraction. Arrive they did, and the CEDEF's head stopped dead in his tracks and watched him silently for a full minute, jaw hanging open.

"You're making a big fool of yourself," Tsuna said coldly, "and an even bigger target."

Iemitsu shut his mouth and observed him with wide eyes and an expression that was a mix of longing and anger. Xanxus entered the room at this moment.

"A problem?" he grunted, obviously suffering from another hangover.

"Yes," Sawada hissed furiously. "Care to explain _what_ my son is doing here?"

"Your son?" Xanxus repeated, frowning.

"Yes, my son! That boy over there!"

By then he was nearly shouting, and people—maids, Varia members—had arrived to watch the scene in earnest. It wasn't every day that the Young Lion of Vongola lost control of his temper. Xanxus looked at Tsuna, who looked back unabashed, and smirked.

"I see no son of yours," he declared.

"Are you fucking kidding me, Xanxus?"

"No," Xanxus said. "Why would I? The kid is one I found during a mission, checking the trash for food and about to go back to his street life. He's not your son."

"Tsuna," Iemitsu then said, turning to the boy. "Tsuna, you remember me, right? What are you doing here, son? Where's your mum?"

Tsuna slowly closed his hands and dug his nails into his palms.

"Tsuna, come here. Come here, please. I'm taking you back to Namimori, all right? I'm taking you back to your mum and everything's going to be all right, you'll see. Xanxus," he added, shooting a dark look at the Varia boss, "this isn't going to go unpunished. When the Ninth learns that you took my son as a hostage, you-"

He stopped talking, but this time it wasn't because of Xanxus; Tsuna was laughing quietly and nursing his bloody palms, suddenly feeling very light on his feet.

Everything was okay. Iemitsu wasn't here for him. Iemitsu still couldn't _see_ him.

"I'm not going anywhere," he said, and Xanxus looked at him curiously, probably surprised to hear his voice after years of not noticing his presence. "I'm staying here and I don't care if you come back with the Ninth himself next time. You lost every power you ever held over my life when you left me alone with that psychopath you call my mother. Now go away."

Iemitsu stayed silent for a long time, blinking a bit too much for his eyes to be totally dry. When he made a move forward, Xanxus stopped him by putting a hand on Tsuna's shoulder and saying icily, "He's mine. Get away from here before I shoot you."

And as a great weight was lifted from his shoulders, Tsuna felt warmth spreading through him, slowly, gently.

xxx

The others were wary of him at first, after learning he was Sawada's son. They stopped voicing their doubts when Xanxus began hitting people each time he heard the CEDEF's head's name. Tsuna had never felt so grateful in his life.

Xanxus also took to training him personally. It was hard and painful and often very dangerous, but he improved quickly and sensing Xanxus's pride was something he secretly cherished with every inch of his soul. His body was strengthening slowly and he became surer of himself and less prone to the isolated behaviour that had defined his first years at the manor. He began talking to people. Soon he went with Xanxus on missions and sometimes he was even sent alone.

Xanxus taught him how to use his Flame. Xanxus taught him to know every limit of his own body and not show them to anyone, even himself. He taught him how to fade in shadows and use the sun as an advantage, how to swim and climb and sleep while staying aware.

The time arrived when the Ninth passed away in his sleep and his son Enrico took his place at the top of the Family. Vongola the Tenth was an obnoxious man, and his methods were as far from his father's as was possible. He preferred attack to defense. His short reign put Vongola in the middle of two wars they couldn't win, and only his death—and the subsequent inheritance of his younger brother Massimo—prevented the Family from drowning into a see of blood. Xanxus watched all this and drank and fucked and slept, and Tsuna watched Basilicum succeed to Iemitsu as the CEDEF's head and thought he understood how his boss felt.

He noticed the creature's existence when he was fifteen.

At first it was just an unfamiliar feeling of annoyance when he noticed Squalo leaving Xanxus's quarters with his hair a mess—why did he have it so long anyway?—and his breath coming in soft, sated pants. Then it was the icy sensation inside his chest when he saw Xanxus flirt with a maid or the fluttering in his stomach when he glimpsed parts of his body through his soaked shirt after their training sessions—the unusual heat settling in his belly when he thought of that body late at night, alone in bed.

Xanxus wasn't handsome. His scars were rough and uneven on his skin, deforming his features and scaring his servants away far more easily than his temper did. He wasn't a good person. He was a killer, and a cruel one at that; messy and violent and not at all ashamed of it.

He was everything Tsuna could ever want.

Xanxus probably would have fucked him if he asked, just like he fucked Squalo when Squalo asked for it. But Tsuna didn't want to be just another name on Xanxus's endless list of meaningless partners. He wanted to be more.

He wanted the feeling he had ever missed. He wanted to be irreplaceable. Unforgettable. He wanted to burn himself among Xanxus's scars and stay on his skin forever, etched into his very being.

So he waited. Even as he noticed the way Xanxus's gaze lingered on him, he made no move. This wasn't something he could rush.

xxx

"You never mind, do you."

Tsuna looked at Xanxus. "What do you mean?" he asked.

Behind them, Squalo snorted to make his presence known. Tsuna was pleased to note that Xanxus seemed completely uncaring of that fact. Instead his boss watched him with an unfamiliar and serious expression. Tsuna felt his breath quicken slightly.

"You never cared that there was blood everywhere. You never cared that I killed people all the time, or that you'd have to kill one day too. Even back then."

Tsuna didn't ask what 'back then' referred to. He knew they were both remembering the unlit street, the stench of alcohol and piss and the blood soiling the ground they both walked on. The dead man that lay there, grotesque in death as he had been in life. The city lights carving bright lines in his sight in the cold—so cold—night.

"I don't see why I should mind," he said. He really didn't. "I've always lived with the knowledge that my life was going to be a 'kill or be killed' one anyway. It's just a bit more extreme than I expected."

He heard Squalo muttering something about lack of respect. Tsuna didn't even look at him. Xanxus's pupils melted his face and his body, and he could feel the burning trail they left behind them on his skin. Shivers ran up his back.

He thought about Xanxus's scars and how he obtained them; how he had defied his brother Enrico's rightful place as capofamiglia, how the Ninth had come one day and encased him in ice. How he had stayed there in the hallway for all to see until several weeks later the Ninth came back and freed him. How Tsuna had slept on the floor next to him for days until he caught a cold and Lussuria confined him to his room.

He had been eight. Xanxus hadn't spared him a glance then. Now he was looking at him and him only, ignoring Squalo's burning jealousy, ignoring the cold creeping up his skin through his torn shirt. Just him.

The creature coiled deeper into his heart.

xxx

Later, he thought about the conversation, and realised they really _were_ living a shitty life. Living by ending other people's lives. He told them about this strange discovery and felt Lussuria's pity lean on him like a human body, and decided not to ever mention it again.

xxx

He had a dream one night, a very strange dream during which he experienced so many feelings at once that when he woke up, he felt as exhausted as if he'd never gone to sleep in the first place.

There had been his Flame and Xanxus's clashing brutally against one another, and the baby hitman Reborn, and people he'd never met who were supporting him; he'd recognised bronco Dino and wondered how in hell that man had wandered inside his mind. There was pain, and fear, and an intense protectiveness he didn't believe he had ever felt in real life. And Xanxus—a heavily scarred Xanxus, much more so than the one he knew and loved—had been glaring at him with hatred and a deep, burning desire to kill.

Tsuna pushed his blanket back and walked to the door, and just when he was about to grab the latch, it opened and Xanxus was there. Sweating, burning, and looking at him as if he'd never seen him before. His hands were glowing and he was apparently struggling to keep them from exploding into an all-out Flame of Wrath.

His embrace was still a furnace when Tsuna fell into it. He didn't mind. He could feel Xanxus's fingers burn straight through his shirt but he didn't mind. Not when there was that gaze on him, the one that let him know what its owner was thinking without needing words.

He understood that he hadn't been the only one dreaming of fire that night.

Having Xanxus make love to him wasn't exactly what Tsuna had expected, but it was far more than he had ever hoped for. He had predicted the absence of anything slow and sweet, the harshness of it all and the pain he would have to overcome with pleasure. He hadn't expected the _heat_; the complete, absolute feeling of Xanxus's core—his _Flame_—sinking into his own and creating a supernova somewhere below his chest, somewhere beyond his heart. The ache it left behind as Xanxus pulled out from him and fell to his side, watching him silently, seemed everlasting.

Tsuna had never been one for words. At this instant, words didn't have a place in the world anymore.

xxx

"What have you done to him?" said Squalo, hands around his throat.

Tsuna smiled. It wasn't a nice smile, and Squalo shuddered.

"Nothing _you_ could have done," he answered. "Nothing anyone but me could ever do."

The grip tightened, but Tsuna was too far gone to notice the pain, too far gone to notice the crazed look that adorned his reflection in the window behind Squalo. The monster inside him was sated and happy and its purr became insane cackling in his mouth.

"I burnt him and let him burn me back. He's mine. You'll never, ever touch him again."

"You little shit."

"Love is never fair," Tsuna panted. "_Never_. But it was even more unfair for you, was it not? Because your opponent was me. You'll never love him like I do. You should give up now and spare yourself the pain."

"I knew him long before you were even born, you _brat_."

"But you've never had this kinship we have. You don't know what it feels like to be cast aside by your father. You don't know what it's like to be abandoned by your mother. You don't know the life on the street, the constant fear of not making it alive at the end of the day and dying somewhere with no one, _no one_ to remember you even existed. You don't know that pain. But I do. And he does." Tsuna breathed, and coughed, because it was probably the first time he'd talked so much in his life.

"You don't understand," he continued with a shaking voice, "you can't. I'm not blaming you. I just won't forgive you if you try to take him away from me."

Squalo released him and let him slide down the wall and onto the carpet, breath still uneven.

"I'll kill every one," Tsuna rasped. "I'll destroy them one by one if they ever try to put themselves between us. Nobody has the right to take him away. They don't know. They'll never know. I won't let them."

The swordsman was still watching him, and for the second time in his life Tsuna felt the suffocating weight pity could take in a single glance. He didn't care. Not this time.

"You're pitiful," Squalo said. "You're the saddest thing that ever lived."

"I know."

"Death is better for people like you."

Tsuna shivered. "I know," he repeated. "But if you kill me, you kill him."

The creature growled low inside him, needy and selfish and desperate for love. For the thing it had been deprived of for so long. For the never-ending attention and affection of its prey. For a vicious cycle of obsession and violence.

xxx

That night, Tsuna took the time to enjoy the warmth of Xanxus's body. To taste and inhale and touch him. To drink in the vividness of his eyes and the colour of his skin. He felt his life with his own and tried to tell himself that even death would not be able to rip that memory away from him.

xxx

Death was cold. But at least it was silent.

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AN: English still isn't my first language, lol. Any advice/criticism is welcome.


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